Former Tennessee Titans great Eddie George says he struggled with depression following his playing days and found peace of mind only a few years ago. / George Walker IV / FILE / THE TENNESSEAN

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When his career ended, the former Titans running back felt like he’d lost a part of his soul, and for a while, his purpose in life.

He dealt with depression. He went to counseling. When the roars of the crowd went silent, he struggled with the real world.

“It never got to those depths where I wanted to end my life, but I can certainty understand how some guys get to that point,’’ George told The Tennessean on Tuesday. “There wasn’t that instant success on the football field, where you worked hard all week and you have a victory and a great game on Sunday. There were some things I had to go through that weren’t necessarily helping me and my family out.

“I can certainly see where guys who don’t have the proper guidance or right mindset can take that turn for the worst.”

A Heisman Trophy winner at Ohio State who ran for 10,009 yards while playing from 1996-2003 with the Titans, George is on steady footing these days, but he admits, at the age of 40, he still fights a “daily battle.”

He’s kept busy, playing the title role this past weekend in The Nashville Shakespeare Festival’s “Othello,” in addition to his broadcasting work during football season. He has a landscaping architecture firm, and he’s in the process of working on teaching a curriculum at his alma mater that deals with the lifestyle of professional sports, through his experiences.

In the interview with The Tennessean, George described a post-football life that put his well-being, his marriage and his friendships in jeopardy as he tried to cope with the reality of his nine-year NFL career being finished. The Titans released George after the 2003 season, and he played his final season with the Cowboys before retiring.

George is scheduled to appear on Showtime’s “60 Minutes Sports” at 9 tonight to discuss his reinvention into a Renaissance man and his post-career struggles.

“The way my career ended had an impact on me the first few years because I had no idea what to do next. It wasn’t really until about three to four years ago when I really started to turn around and become more responsible about where I was and not being in this funk, in this depression and so forth,’’ George said on Tuesday.

“I was fighting demons and trying to get a peace of mind that did damage to me and my family, my wife. … Hanging out and chasing (women) and all the wrong things. All the things that served me as a player didn’t serve me as a man who’s 35, 36, 37 years old trying to redefine himself. Something had to change in me.”

George said he can understand the problems other retired professional athletes have faced over the years. Former Chargers linebacker Junior Seau committed suicide in May 2012, just a few months after former Bears star Dave Duerson died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Paul Oliver, a former defensive back with the Chargers, was found dead last year, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot.

In July 2012, The NFL launched a crisis support line called NFL Life Line for players, former players and their families. The same year, a 21-year-old LPGA golfer was stopped for a DUI, and George, who is married, was a passenger in the car. Earlier that year, George and Tamara George released a book “Married for Real.”

George is being open about his personal story because he wants people to be aware of the difficult process for pro athletes when they leave the game, “but you do it with diligence, with patience, with love and persistence.”

“What defines success? Is it having millions of dollars, or is it peace of mind? And that is ultimately what I am talking about, having that peace of mind where I am happy and confident in who I am and what I am doing and where I am going versus floundering, searching for that peace of mind,’’ he said. “Think of guys like Junior Seau and even Steve (McNair) to some degree, being out of the game for the first time. You search for peace of mind, and you often search in the wrong places. You look at (actor) Philip Seymour Hoffman, and he had a successful movie career, but he was fighting demons (and was found dead over the weekend of an apparent drug overdose).

“There was never a point for me where I was in the bottom of the Cumberland River, I had an epiphany, and I turned my life around. There was a series of things that made me change things because I was changing into something I didn’t want to be.”

George, who has homes in Nashville and Columbus, Ohio, said the low point of his professional career came during the preseason in 2004. He’d joined the Cowboys that offseason, following his release from the Titans.

It was during a Monday night preseason game against the Titans when it really hit him, he said. He’d help build a name for the Titans logo, and he was no longer a part of it. He was emotionally devastated, he said. At the end of the season, his career was over. He did his best to cope, he said.

“Oftentimes you don’t have a chance to go out riding on a white horse,” he said. “A lot of times the ending, it is written for you, and that happened to me. I didn’t have a chance to write my own ending, and that bothered me.”

After some turbulence in the years since, George likes where he is today.

In March he’ll even be featured as a design judge on a new reality TV show, “American Dream Builders.”

George believes he’s now on a solid foundation himself.

“It is an ongoing process, and it is establishing my principles and making a commitment to living and being a lot better than I was when I left the game of football and what I am doing now in my life,’’ George said. “The dark period that I went through, you have to sustain from it, but it is not like I am on the other side. ...

“Some of the things you have to go through to find your next life purpose can be daunting, it can be intimidating and it can be exciting, but it’s a process you have to go through to get there. That’s what I want people to know: It is difficult but you do it with diligence, with patience, with love and persistence.”